Medical Devices for Pediatric Apnea Monitoring and Therapy: Past and New Trends

Apnea in the pediatric population is associated with increased morbidity and mortality in a large number of developed as well as developing countries. It is even more prominent in preterm newborn infants and is commonly referred to as apnea of prematurity. Its current diagnosis and therapy involve the use of traditional technologies, which often result in discomfort to the infants due to the use of invasive devices attached to their sensitive skin, especially in overnight clinical sleep analysis (for over a 12- or 24-h period). Emerging trends for the point-of-care diagnosis of this sleep disorder are focused on the design of integrated devices for less complex and noninvasive monitoring. This paper presents a review of the state of the art of clinical technologies and methodologies for sleep apnea detection and their pros and cons, with particular focus on their working principles and relevance to pediatrics. Moreover, an in-depth discussion on emerging future technologies envisioned to be integral parts of the daily home-based applications is included in the paper.